(no subject)

Today Mom and I had lunch at the Playwright and went to the matinee of Doubt. Very, very good. It won the Pulitzer Prize, and I would think it'll be a strong contender for a Tony.

After the play, we went to Shakespeare & Co. bookstore and then back to the Strand (we went there Friday too). Then we moseyed over to the Union Square Cafe. Mom had foie gras and duck, and I had tuna tartare and filet mignon. Everything was really good except the steak--it was sort of wild-tasting. Fanciest place I've been in a while--the sommelier or whatever you call him made a big production out of pouring my fake beer, and they had people who would refold your napkin if you left the table. Thankfully, they didn't have people who followed to the bathroom, which I hear they do at some places.

(no subject)

So today we got up and went to Canal Street (edge of Chinatown) for Mom to check out counterfeit goods. :) She'd bought knockoff Louis Vutton bags there before, but today they were nowhere in evidence. Turns out that all you have to do is say the magic word to get one of the workers to take you in the back room or downstairs to show you the goods. I guess Louis and the boys have been cracking down, though I guess all they've succeeded in doing is getting them off street display, for you get approached every two seconds now on Canal St. by people mumbling, "Vutton, Chanel, Gucci, you wanna see?" It's not exactly hidden.

So anyway, we went downstairs a couple of times to check out the genuine knockoffs. The first time it happened, I thought, oh jesus, we're going down--they're taking us downstairs, and they're going to cut our throats ear-to-ear and sell us into slavery. OK, not really, but it did feel pretty fucking shady. But I was just along for the ride, so to speak.

In the second backroom we went in, there was this couple from Indiana who were very proud of the fact that they buy up whole lots of knockoff bags and take them back to sell to their friends. The big overgrown husband sumbitch was telling me that they go to NYC and L.A. all the time to buy that shit and sell it. He said they almost got nailed at some airport with a huge suitcase full of fake bags, and they were shitting their pants, etc., etc., and now they ship all their stuff back home. He said how great the quality was of some of the bags, and they had a Louie suitcase that was just GORGEOUS, blase blase. At that point, I was making HORRIBLE "get me OUT of here before I call this fat bastard a douchebag" faces at Mom. Finally, I did escape, and soon enough we made our way into the subway. Mom made a huge score, but I didn't get so much as a wallet. Oh well.

Hmmm, what next? Oh yeah, we went to the Grand Central Oyster Bar and got oysters and soft-shell crabs. Excellent stuff. Then we headed back to the hotel, got our shit, and headed downtown to the market at Union Square. There wasn't much of anything at the market--too early in the season, I guess--but we did find a Whole Foods, where we got a few good things. From there, we drove all the way uptown to Zabar's, where we got some excellent olives and other fine foods, then went next door for some yogurt. We left town around 4:30 and got some pretty thick traffic on the way home, but it wasn't so bad. Not as bad as I feared for near rush hour on a weekday.

So yeah, we got home, unpacked, and got Dayton St. Apizza. We fucking own you people.

Here are some pretty decent pitchers.

Santa gots the scrabs. Or maybe he's humping a lobster on Canal Street in the middle of April. Either way, it's goddamn freaky.



( All right, I'll lj-cut. But I'm not happy about it. )